Alabama was sleepwalking at the start of the 87th Iron Bowl on Saturday afternoon at Bryant-Denny Stadium.

It needed a wakeup call.

It needed something to get it going in an Iron Bowl that for once didn’t factor into a potential trip to Atlanta or a potential trip to the College Football Playoff.

And its feisty, laser-focused in-state rival from The Plains was happy to oblige.

Auburn didn’t let the matter of it being in the middle of a coaching search get in its way of making Alabama’s life difficult. This was the Iron Bowl, after all. The Tigers’ interim head coach, Cadillac Williams, had inspired Auburn too much during his first 3 games in charge, and his team looked inspired again at the start on Saturday, taking a 7-0 midway through the 1st quarter on Robby Ashford’s 24-yard touchdown run.

That’s when Alabama’s alarm clock went off, and it eventually got going in a 49-27 victory that put the wraps on an at times painful, sometimes dramatic, a few times heartbreaking and a lot of times exhausting 10-2 regular season.

Yes, as inexcusable as it might have been, the 8th-ranked Crimson Tide overslept a bit as a little more than a 3-touchdown favorite. They shouldn’t have needed the Tigers to provide that 1st-quarter jolt, but they did.

In the final game of a very imperfect, very unusual regular season in Tuscaloosa, it seemed rather appropriate though, right?

Saturday was Alabama circa 2022, all in a nutshell, all in 1 afternoon of uneven football. It was a 3 1/2-hour example of why the Crimson Tide were again good enough to reach double-digit victories like they always do and also why they won’t be playing Georgia next week in a rematch of the SEC Championship Game. It was an example of why there is no Atlanta this fall and no Playoff semifinal about a month later.

And, yet it was an example of what could’ve been in December or January had they showed up for just a few more plays in Knoxville and Baton Rouge, or even in just 1 of those 2 crushing road losses. Because the Tide took that buzzing alarm clock that Auburn set off with that early touchdown Saturday, they eventually turned it off, threw it down angrily and went to work on the Tigers defense.

By the end of the 1st quarter, Bama led 14-7. And by the end of the 1st half, it was 35-14, and Auburn’s visions of salvaging a 6-6 regular season were pretty much gone. The Tigers can still somehow salvage a bowl berth even with their 5-7 record, but that’s a story for another day in the very near future, along with their ongoing coaching search that now will no longer include Lane Kiffin.

This was very likely Bryce Young’s final Iron Bowl, and after Auburn scored 1st and the Tigers were going crazy on the sideline along with their fiery interim coach, Young calmly got the Tide going. A little over 2 minutes after that Auburn touchdown, Young was in the end zone himself with a 5-yard TD run. About 5 minutes after that, Young was connecting with running back Jase McClellan on a 10-yard touchdown pass that put Bama ahead for good late in the 1st quarter.

And after DJ Dale recovered a fumble by Jarquez Hunter, it took 4 plays for the Crimson Tide to score again, as Roydell Williams’ 5-yard touchdown burst gave Bama a 21-7 lead on the 1st play of the 2nd quarter.

Yeah, that was quick.

Suddenly, it wasn’t 7-0 Auburn anymore.

And Alabama had answered that wakeup call with a furious scoring barrage that seemed to say “not today” to an Auburn team that stormed into Tuscaloosa with some juice thanks to 2 straight wins and, yes, a driving force named Cadillac who didn’t much care about the coaching search that was going on in lock step with the Iron Bowl itself.

Auburn wasn’t ready to go away completely though, not in the Iron Bowl, not with its current head coach putting so much energy into what could be his final game on the sideline for his alma mater. Ashford answered with a touchdown pass to Ja’Varrius Johnson to pull the Tigers within 1 score, and it was 21-14 with a ton of time still left in the 2nd quarter and a ton of time still left on Saturday to get that 6th victory, after all.

Then Alabama seemed to say “not today” again. Specifically, Young screamed it out loud, connecting on a 32-yard touchdown pass with Ja’Corey Brooks and then a 27-yard TD strike to Traeshon Holden with 54 seconds left in the 1st half that was an absolute backbreaker for the Tigers.

Young put on a show in those 1st 30 minutes, with 3 TD passes and 1 TD run. By game’s end, he would pile up 343 yards passing, with many a big play and only 1 late, insignificant interception.

Plainly put, the great Bryce Young was putting his stamp on what was likely his swan song at Bryant-Denny Stadium. He jogged off the field a winner 1 last time in Tuscaloosa (we think), he will lead Alabama in its bowl game that will be determined in another week (Alabama fans hope), and he will be picked by a lucky team in next spring’s NFL Draft (we would assume).

On Saturday, that lucky team was Alabama. It was fortunate to have Young, who led a 9-play, 72-yard touchdown drive on the 1st possession of the 2nd half that ended with McClellan’s 2-yard run and gave Bama an ultra-commanding 42-14 lead.

Yeah, Auburn didn’t quit. Not on the Iron Bowl stage and not while playing for the interim coach that the Tigers would run through a brick wall for. They scored the next 10 points and kept Young off the field for quite a bit of time on those 2 scoring drives. But after all that, they were still 18 points behind with a little over 12 minutes left, and the mountain for Auburn to climb was way too steep.

And a late field goal that made it 42-27 wasn’t going to change that, either.

This might not have been Alabama’s season.

But it was the Crimson Tide’s Iron Bowl, despite the rather fitting slow start, despite the rather appropriate 11 penalties for 102 yards and despite allowing Auburn to rush for over 300 yards.

As darkness fell on the state of Alabama, 1 of its feisty teams was getting ready for a new head coach, whoever that was, and its other 1 was getting ready to be sent to a bowl game, wherever that was.

For Alabama, there was no Atlanta in its immediate future.

But there was another Iron Bowl victory to celebrate and, no matter its record or its ranking, that’s always a wonderful thing.